The story does not require two of each "species". Though if it did, there are 14 plus definitions for "species". It reads "Kinds" which means they were "parents" of those that followed. How few "Kinds" are needed, God only knows.

edit Are you saying that doves and ravens are the common ancestor of all modern birds?

The story does not require two of each "species". Though if it did, there are 14 plus definitions for "species". It reads "Kinds" which means they were "parents" of those that followed. How few "Kinds" are needed, God only knows.

edit Are you saying that doves and ravens are the common ancestor of all modern birds?

Nope. Just two mentioned.

Ravens and doves are quite advanced in the grand scheme of things, if all of the other "kinds" of bird on the ark were similarly advanced you'd need a fair amount of them[1]If the other "kinds" of bird weren't as evolved as the dove and raven and could have given rise to these 2 species why bring these 2 specific types on board?

The story does not require two of each "species". Though if it did, there are 14 plus definitions for "species". It reads "Kinds" which means they were "parents" of those that followed. How few "Kinds" are needed, God only knows.

edit Are you saying that doves and ravens are the common ancestor of all modern birds?

Nope. Just two mentioned.

Ravens and doves are quite advanced in the grand scheme of things, if all of the other "kinds" of bird on the ark were similarly advanced you'd need a fair amount of them[1]If the other "kinds" of bird weren't as evolved as the dove and raven and could have given rise to these 2 species why bring these 2 specific types on board?

I don't wish that you subscribe to my reasoning, at all. .....I don't ask that you follow my thinking just because I think it.

Nice red herring - but that wasn't the point I was making. What I was attempting to do, notably with the Harry Potter reference, was to see if you could explain to me why your line of reasoning would be correctly applied in some circumstances, but not in others - in essence, to see if you actually had a cohesive method of analysis, or if in fact you choose to apply different standards to different sources in order to justify a pre-chosen conclusion.

You shied away from answering those questions, and that speaks volumes to me.

Critical analysis of literature does take into account the variety of sources and does not apply the samelevel of credibility or literalness to all sources across the board.....

...it's the parts that are so perfectly sound that convince me that the "wacky" parts are sound as well.

But I'm all ears. What specific standards do you use to establish the level of credibility of the Bible? Because what you'd said above seemed to simply point to you deciding that some buts were right, and therefore EVERYTHING had to be right, no matter how weird-sounding.

Have you applied those same standards to other holy books? If not why not? I do hope you are not saying that you are applying different standards to the Bible BECAUSE it is the Bible, because that would sound like special pleading, and assuming the conclusion. So there must be some criteria that gives one answer when applied to the Bible, and another answer when applied to (let's say) the Koran. I'm interested in knowing what that criteria is.

<snip>I'm not going to research this one. It sounds like nobody wanted to go anywhere near him. The point being that he had no family or friends. As a result, he hung from the tree with a broken neck till his body was rotten and fell to the ground. Then his insides gushed out. Or it may have happened in hours. The text gives minimal coverage of this particular event. With "different reporters" you get different views of the same event.

I guess it was convenient to leave out the word "headlong". So in your version, Judas hung himself and all the gory details of the splat.

Now sir, where is your proof that this is what happened? Just like you said about proof in science, isn't this just a new fiction? Words work both ways, anyone can come up with a fancy new story[1]but if you are attempting to prove that it is not a biblical contradiction then lets have some data to support it.

Mine involves Judas in the International Space Station tying the other end of a fireproof noose to the base of an Acme rocket, pointing it towards Earth and firing it. Its technically not a "hanging", but if you resolve the vectors it is just the opposing forces that matter. With the rocket exceeding certain velocities sufficient force would be exerted by the noose to choke Judas or snap his neck. This way its a hanging and a headlong fall!

On the Noah's Ark story, SW, you are just pasting "god's magic" over all the practical and scientific contradictions. [1]

Once you go there, you have to wonder why god had Noah go through all that hassle of building an impossibly ginormous boat, etc. in the first place. Just have god "magic away" all the evil people (and evil plant life, evil panda bears, evil honeybees, evil flamingos, evil giraffes and evil hyenas--well, that was redundant) and start over with a nice new non-evil earth.

There's a reason we don't build aircraft carrier size boats out of wood--it is impossible. For example, ask professional boat builders and wood workers: it simply can't be done. To locate, cut and transport the huge number of trees (from what forest in the Middle East?) needed would take so many months that the wood is rotting before you even start to build.

And it would take years for a handful of people to construct with just hand tools--if they were able to keep all the wood from rotting. A wooden boat of apartment building size could not even float, let alone withstand a storm at sea. If it had sufficient ventilation, ie holes, to keep the inhabitants from suffocating, it would take on water and sink.

And, no, not all animals hibernate just because it gets dark. Where the heck did you get that idea? Trying to avoid the massive feeding, watering and waste disposal problems, eh? And the thorny issue of keeping the predators away from the prey (and from each other) for weeks at a time....

Only certain rodents, reptiles and of course bears hibernate, sometimes only for a few weeks, mainly in response to cold not dark, and certainly not in response to heat. Primates and birds don't hibernate. Neither do most insect, canine and feline species. Try again.

And while you are at it, explain to us why we can't paste "god's magic" over the impossible stuff in any other religion besides yours. Do you also believe that it is forbidden to touch menstruating women or dogs, and that martyrs for Islam go straight to paradise/heaven? Do you also think that cows are sacred because they harbor the migrating human soul?

One of the many problems with throwing the "god's magic" blanket over the ark story: god knows how to keep every species alive and well, but lets things suffer and go extinct all the time. Even if you think humans are bad and sinful and deserve death, why extend that fate to all the other life forms on the planet?

« Last Edit: June 14, 2013, 12:52:47 PM by nogodsforme »

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When all of Cinderella's finery changed back at midnight, why didn't the shoes disappear? What's up with that?

On the Noah's Ark story, SW, you are just pasting "god's magic" over all the practical and scientific contradictions. [nb]One of the many problems with throwing the "god's magic" blanket over the ark story: god knows how to keep every species alive

There is no mention of every species. If you can't stick to the story, your questions will be all wrong. Two of each "kind" which means they were the parents of those that followed. There is no more detail available.And the boat floats fine.http://i132.photobucket.com/albums/q5/cdp40/Noahs-Ark-full.jpgNo storms or even waves are mentioned. Please stick to the story as written.

No storms or even waves are mentioned. Please stick to the story as written.

If we are sticking to the story as written then you must account for the unbelievably huge amount of water that has to fall in an incredibly short period of time.[1] To think there were no storms or waves would be to ignore the story as written.

If he believed in science we could have told SkyWriting that models need their scaling factors considered before making assumptions. I think that's why he has no clue on why there should be waves and storms in the real world. His explanation on the deluge seems to be based on how water is slowly filled into a glass.

SkyWriting, you can make a paper airplane from a paper page torn from a Bible, it will glide fairly well. That doesn't mean that an airplane made by the same type of paper, but the size of a tennis court, will fly.

I understand that the complete lack of evidence for a flooded earth is a little hard for you to overcome, but your assumptions that it actually happened requires that you go ahead and make stuff up to compensate for your silly ideas. An activity which does nothing, unless one counts an inflated ego as an accomplishment.

American Indians have oral histories to go back far further than the alleged story of the flood. Chinese civilization started before the alleged date of the flood and continued unabated by imagined high waters. There are trees and other living things that have been alive longer the alleged date of the flood. Cave painting in France, some over 17,000 years old, show no signs of ever being under water. Something that would have more or less ruined them anyway. The genetic evidence in humans shows no sign that our kind had dwindled to just a few 6,000 years ago. On the other hand, there is genetic evidence that humans were reduced to a total population of around 10,000 after a huge volcano did dastardly things to the environment 70,000 years ago.

We have trillions of tons of evidence for continental drift (I'm guessing here. I haven't actually weighted the continents). We have an incredible array of fossils and other pieces of evidence, including currently existing life forms, that show that evolution is real. We have chemistry, physics, botany, zoology, genetics, astronomy, geology, oceanography, volcanology and other disciplines that have confirmed, independently, dates and events and continuums and realities that fly in the face of your one single book with one short story about one impossibly put upon family in one impossibly naïve story about one evidence-free event.

No storms or even waves are mentioned. Please stick to the story as written.

Very well, then: Please do the following math problem.

"And the rain fell on the earth 40 days and 40 nights." (Genesis 7:12)

"{The waters} rose greatly on the earth, and all the high mountains under the entire heavens were covered." (Genesis 7:19)

The highest mountain on Earth is Chomolungma (Mount Everest), at a height of 29,029 feet above sea level.

What was the rate of rainfall for the 40 days and 40 nights?

We don't have a date for the flood given, and catastrophic events, such as in this story, could change the topography of the planet surface. The story does state that deep caverns of water burst. How much this may have changed the earth surface is not documented in the story. As you have illustrated, science is almost clueless about past events.

I understand that the complete lack of evidence for a flooded earth is a little hard for you to overcome, but your assumptions that it actually happened requires that you go ahead and make stuff up to compensate for your silly ideas. An activity which does nothing, unless one counts an inflated ego as an accomplishment.

American Indians have oral histories to go back far further than the alleged story of the flood. Chinese civilization started before the alleged date of the flood and continued unabated by imagined high waters. There are trees and other living things that have been alive longer the alleged date of the flood. Cave painting in France, some over 17,000 years old, show no signs of ever being under water. Something that would have more or less ruined them anyway. The genetic evidence in humans shows no sign that our kind had dwindled to just a few 6,000 years ago. On the other hand, there is genetic evidence that humans were reduced to a total population of around 10,000 after a huge volcano did dastardly things to the environment 70,000 years ago.

We have trillions of tons of evidence for continental drift (I'm guessing here. I haven't actually weighted the continents). We have an incredible array of fossils and other pieces of evidence, including currently existing life forms, that show that evolution is real. We have chemistry, physics, botany, zoology, genetics, astronomy, geology, oceanography, volcanology and other disciplines that have confirmed, independently, dates and events and continuums and realities that fly in the face of your one single book with one short story about one impossibly put upon family in one impossibly naïve story about one evidence-free event.

If he believed in science we could have told SkyWriting that models need their scaling factors considered before making assumptions. I think that's why he has no clue on why there should be waves and storms in the real world. His explanation on the deluge seems to be based on how water is slowly filled into a glass.

One group built engineering models and subjected their Ark to ocean scale waves. It broke in half.My response to the challenge was that they followed the story to build the model, but didn't followthe very same story regarding conditions. Waves were not mentioned.

I suggest one take the Bible as a whole revelation. Then even more issues surface:-God controlled the sea for Moses when he separated the waters. -Jesus calmed the waves in a storm.

Clearly, the scriptures show that God has good control of water and God is not limited bythe "natural" properties of water.

If we are sticking to the story as written then you must account for the unbelievably huge amount of water that has to fall in an incredibly short period of time.[1] To think there were no storms or waves would be to ignore the story as written.

The story does say that deep earth reserves of water burst forth. The volume of them may account for most of the water. No details are given. Waves can be calmed.Jesus calmed the waves and Moses parted the sea. God controlling water is a bigtheme in the Bible. Nature is often subdued in the writings.

I want you to consider this carefully: If god created everything, then god is responsible for the good things as well as the bad things. If god made the solutions, then god also made the problems.

If god created everything in nature, then god created poison ivy, herpes, cancer, bubonic plague, cockroaches, ectopic pregnancies, hurricanes, earthquakes, floods and face-eating bacteria--as well as all the things people have done to help with those problems.

If god created human intelligence, god is responsible for torture-- and Amnesty International; slavery-- and abolition; terrorist cells, nuclear weapons-- and peace activists.

I would say that this is dependent on god possessing the following characteristics:All-powerful (or extraordinarily powerful enough to manifest almost all outcomes he/she/it desires)All-knowing (or knowing enough to be able to predict with significant precision and accuracy the results of his/her/its actions or the actions of other entities)

I am uncertain if junebug72 subscribes to such a conception of god.

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Unless you want to somehow say that that there are things in the universe that god did not create?

If god does not possess the above characteristics, it's possible that god did create everything but possesses insufficient knowledge and/or intellectual processing capability to reliably predict the results of his/her/its actions. It's possible that god does possess such knowledge and intellectual processing capability, but is insufficiently powerful enough to correct for mistakes and is, for some reason or another, totally OK with that.

Yes I think God's power is limited to the resources at God's disposal. As with anything that is created you can only use what you have access to. I believe there are laws of nature that even God can not break. When it comes to God there is hardly anything you can be 100% sure of.

If we are sticking to the story as written then you must account for the unbelievably huge amount of water that has to fall in an incredibly short period of time.[1] To think there were no storms or waves would be to ignore the story as written.

The story does say that deep earth reserves of water burst forth. The volume of them may account for most of the water. No details are given. Waves can be calmed.Jesus calmed the waves and Moses parted the sea. God controlling water is a bigtheme in the Bible. Nature is often subdued in the writings.

The God I believe in wouldn't kill all those people; children. It does not coincide with a Loving God. That is the contradiction. Drowning is one of the worst ways to die. These atheist have a good point about the Bible. I believe in God but I do not believe the bible is God's holy word. Plus I don't believe anything after Moses went over God's head, if God even gave him commandments, to say kill people after God just commanded them not to. Moses really screwed things up. No offense Screwtape.

The date of the flood is not known, nor the conditions of the time. Science only had clues about about the past. All stories about past events are fiction to varying degrees.

As a theist, you need to clarify which of the thousands of versions of christianity you adhere to. Most believers who show up here all excited about the flood are young earthers, who think the planet is only 6,000 years old, etc. If you are not one of those, you might clarify so that we can diss you for the right reasons.

And while your stories about the past may be fictions, the stories that science tries to tell are not fiction so much as they are approximate, date-wise and such. When a paleontologist says that the dinosaurs were wiped out by an asteroid, they don't pretend that it happened on June 15, 64997987 B.C. Right now we have no ability to be more accurate. That does not make the date fictional.

Now it may be wrong. Maybe something else happened. But the best way to make sure that we don't ever know more is to make sure that at least half of our population spends its entire life laughing at silly science instead of doing research. That'll keep us in the dark for ages.

Do you have any writings from over the last 4000 years or so showing when ocean waves have stopped?

This is what is wrong with biblical belief. Christians claim ridiculous facts, then need to twist logic into knots to support these beliefs. IMO, the wisdom that IS important from religion has NOTHING to do with the story of Noah, unless you count it as a children's story to show people that there are society evils that are harmful, such as theft, and society should punish this. - no god needed, or present

We don't have a date for the flood given, and catastrophic events, such as in this story, could change the topography of the planet surface. The story does state that deep caverns of water burst. How much this may have changed the earth surface is not documented in the story. As you have illustrated, science is almost clueless about past events.

That's not what I asked, SW. I asked you to do the math problem. This is an open-book test, so you may use a calculator.

The story does say that deep earth reserves of water burst forth. The volume of them may account for most of the water. No details are given.

It also says the windows of heaven were thrown open. Was that figurative? What percent did they account for? Where is evidence of these "deep earth reserves"?

As an aside, why is it that people arguing for an actual Noachian flood always want to find ways for it to have been scientifically possible and not just say "magic"? They don't look for plausible explanations for the resurrection, they just say "magic". They don't look for plausible explanations for the parting of the Red Sea, they just say "magic". And on and on and on. Yet when it comes to the flood, xians all try to put on a lab coat and explain how this could have plausibly happened. Then they fail horribly and look like morons.

You made me smile here. Why? Because now I know what particular button to push to really piss you off, and how you respond. See, you really show how bad your debating skills really are when you don't speak about the person who you feel insulted you but lash out at either their family or significant others.

It doesn't show how cruel I am (almost everyone here already knows) but it shows how cruel you actually are by attacking people who have nothing to do with conversation to begin with.

Thank you for the future ammo.

Oh, by the by: I'm not married.

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Why use the word probably.

To get you to respond the way i know you actually want to. Are you learning yet?

As an aside, why is it that people arguing for an actual Noachian flood always want to find ways for it to have been scientifically possible and not just say "magic"?

I often wonder about this too.

Everything else about Judeo-Christian belief seems to have a decidedly magical slant to it -- Talking Snake™, chatty burning bush, people coming back from the dead. I think this is a situation where the silliness happens to intersect with something that does happen in the real world, albeit in a more moderate form. Knowing that "It was magic" doesn't usually work on skeptics, apologists are playing at science in an attempt to get a foot in the door.

If god had really been thinking, he would have just had Noah and the family make space suits for themselves and all of the animals, poofed away the earth and made a new one.

And screw the animals. If he really made them all in the first place, his willingness to save a couple of each "kind" isn't really anything that is going to get the PETA people to nominate him for an award or anything, so he should have just put the Noah crew in a space craft and then redid everything and tried again.

In truth, he should have just started over with everything, but that wouldn't fit the Noah storyline so he wasn't permitted that luxury. Especially since the Noah clan went south, behavior-wise and belief wise, etc. rather quickly. Something I guess god couldn't foresee.

Hey, wait a minute. He's a god. He knew. He knew and he still did it wrong? This story is getting a little fishy!

Unless it didn't happen and is all made up. Then it makes all the sense in the world. Like most fiction does.